One hotel-booking platform we often mention is Badazhou, which makes it easy to book various hotels’ preferred rates and earn extra points. Recently I came across a new player that’s quite interesting, that I’m sharing today – Gondola, a newly established platform that offers hotel and airline related services.
Point Tracking
One of its features is points tracking, which may remind some of you of AwardWallet, a tool I personally use a lot. But Gondola works differently: you grant it access to your Gmail inbox, and it scans relevant emails to summarise your hotel and airline account information.
This method has pros and cons. The advantage is that it doesn’t require logging into accounts, making it faster, more convenient, and much more stable than AwardWallet. The downside is that it relies on specific emails from hotel and airline programs, so updates may be incomplete or delayed.
Of course, for me the biggest concern is granting inbox access, which is an extremely private and sensitive area. Personally I wouldn’t use this feature.
Hotel Booking
Gondola’s core business is actually hotel booking. If you’re familiar with platforms like Badazhou, the model will look familiar: they act as a travel agency and can book hotels for you, but the bookings are treated as direct rather than third-party. This means:
- You earn hotel points and night credits as usual
- Pre-authorisation and payment are handled by the hotel, not Gondola
In other words, it works just like booking directly on the hotel website, but on top of that you also earn Gondola’s rewards. You can also use it purely as a hotel search engine; it shows both cash and points rates across major hotel groups in the region, although its geographic recognition seems a bit hit-or-miss.
As for pricing, in theory it should match the official site. I checked five hotels from different chains in Shanghai:
- Park Hyatt Shanghai
- The Hongta Hotel, a Luxury Collection Hotel
- Sofitel Shanghai Hongqiao
- Waldorf Astoria on the Bund
- Holiday Inn Express Jing’an Temple
The first two matched the member rates on the official sites. The other three didn’t show member rates but matched the public rates. When booking, you enter your personal details and loyalty number, and the booking should be automatically linked to your hotel account.
Unlike Badazhou, Gondola currently does not offer any special or preferred rates – only standard rates.
Tier Structure
All hotel bookings through Gondola earn a flat 3% cashback. After registration, you can also activate a status challenge, and get a tier upgrade if you meet the requirements within 30 days:
- Silver: 5 nights or $1,500 in spend, cashback increasing to 5%
- Gold: 10 nights or $3,000 in spend, cashback increasing to 7%
You only need to book within the 30-day window, and the stays can be completed later. The status is valid for 12 months upon successful completion.
If you register using my referral link, you’ll receive a $50 cashback after your first completed stay, which is quite generous! Here’s how their cashback works: if your booking cost is less than your cashback balance, you can use the cashback for a “free stay,” with Gondola covering the cost. It cannot be used for partial payments or withdrawn.
Overall, I think Gondola has a promising business model and a clean user interface. And the $50 first-stay cashback is pretty appealing – feel free to try it out and share your experience! Thanks to @Max for flagging Gondola to me.
Recent Comments